My Mini Me's

My daughter looks JUST like me. When she was born, they brought her out of the operating room and the first thing my Mom said was, "Oh my God, it's like having Nikki all over again." Literally, she looks JUST like me....except for her hair. There is a picture of me from when I was born and when you set it side-by-side with one of Lilly on her birthday you can not believe the resemblance. If it wasn't for the brownish tinge to the picture and the seventies-era baby blanket I'm wrapped in, you'd think it was the same baby. When she was a little squirt, and we were all out together, people would constantly stop us and say, "Wow, doesn't she look just like her Daddy?!!?" Which she didn't of course, except for her hair. Now, people get our Christmas card and cannot believe just how much she looks like me. I always struggle wondering if that's a bad thing or a good thing. I think she is beautiful - but I've never thought that of myself.

Here we are:

Now, on the other hand, I have this little boy who looks EXACTLY like his Dad. It really is uncanny how much they look like us, respectively. When people have commented on how much he and Logan look alike Brandon's response has always been the same, "I made him for spare parts!"

BUT, although Logan looks like him, AND I hear he acts just like Brandon did as a little kid, he is my mini me in a different way. He has OCD. I remember back when he was just a toddler, he was sitting in his little bath seat, playing with his bath toys while I chatted with Brandon. All of a sudden Brandon's expression changed. When I turned around he was not playing with his toys...he was moving all of the shampoo bottles into a line on the shelf in the bathtub and turning them so that all of the labels were facing out! Brandon's response? "You gave him your disease!!!"

And since then it's continued. Unlike my sweet, messy daughter, Logan is pretty organized. He keeps his room pretty clean. He likes to line things up: army guys, cars, dinosaurs, action figures. He also obsesses about things. Whatever it is that he likes at the moment he REALLY likes. Yesterday we spent some of our snowcation building some of the new Lego sets he got for Christmas. Today he brought his big bin down and built things ALL day. He and Brandon built this robot that he cannot stop bragging about. And when I tucked him in to bed tonight the last thing he said was, "I can't wait to play with Legos ALL day tomorrow too!"

In some ways I'm sorry that he got that from me. It's kind of a pain to have this mild "need" to keep things a certain way or obsess over things. Then again, I'm hoping that he will continue to like to be clean; to have a place for things and to keep them there.

Here's me and my wild (but organized) little boy:

Maybe someday his wife will thank me. Then again, maybe she won't!